Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Esther McVey and Teresa Pearce

Monday 13th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Esther McVey]

I am afraid none of those are true. I see that the hon. Gentleman gathered much information together, but let us see what happens; as I said, we have got to get this right. We have to get the housing right. We have got to have more smaller buildings. He wrote to me as he did not understand about conversions and I had to lay it out clearly in the letter; the National Housing Federation agreed with me. Despite not knowing the facts, he did produce a press release for the papers. We are getting conversions right, sorting out the problem and helping as many people as possible.

[Teresa Pearce (Erith and Thamesmead) (Lab)]

17. What assessment he has made of the effect of the under-occupancy penalty on carers.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

Live-in carers are provided for as part of the assessment of household need. An additional room for non-resident overnight carers is allowed in certain circumstances. Discretionary housing payment funding has been increased to £180 million for 2013-14 to help support vulnerable claimants to adjust to the reforms.

[Teresa Pearce]

Many children grow up with separated parents, but I think we would all agree that joint parenting is in the best interests of the child. One of my constituents is a devoted father whose small son lives with him 50% of the time, but he now has to lose his son’s bedroom because the benefits system will accept only one parent as the “main carer”. Will the Minister re-examine that rule and consider an exemption?

[Esther McVey]

The hon. Lady is right to bring this matter to the House, and such situations are always difficult, but the room would be allocated to whoever was the main carer of the child. In this instance, that is the mother and that is who we would be looking to. We would not be supporting two sets of rooms in two separate houses, as we are trying to get this housing policy right.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Esther McVey and Teresa Pearce

Monday 5th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Teresa Pearce (Erith and Thamesmead) (Lab)]

24. What discussions his Department has had with Baroness Grey-Thompson following the publication of her report on the effect on disabled people of the introduction of universal credit.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

Since Baroness Grey-Thompson’s report was released, I have attended meetings with her twice where the contents of her report have been discussed.

[Teresa Pearce]

“Holes in the Safety Net”, the report just mentioned, indicated that about 450,000 disabled people lose out under the universal credit rules. This number was also raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg), the Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee, in a recent Westminster Hall debate that the Minister attended. Will she listen to these two highly respected women and amend her plans?

[Esther McVey]

We have been listening very much. We found some of the reports to be highly selective and quite skewed. They did not take into consideration how much extra support was going to people with disabilities, but we are listening, there is transitional protection and we will be releasing the assessment criteria later in the year.